Wheeling Gull Isle suffering

I suck at writing stuff. Just to be clear: her tail is facing the ocean, her head is laying in the sand. The water is just barely washing over her as the waves come in, but are not coming in far enough to cover her face. If that makes sense. You do NOT have to match my post length. I got carried away. @Brisbane

The ghost was long gone. She didn’t know how long it had been since their fight. She’d passed out afterwards. Now she awoke on the beach once more, the tangy smell of salt in her nose and the sound the waves in her ears. She opened her eyes. It was nighttime. It was cold. She craned her neck around with a groan and looked at the stars, wondering how long she’d been out. She was now so weak that she felt close to death. Perhaps that was an overreaction or perhaps not. Her body was stiff and aching. She moved to try and sit up and screamed in agony when she stretched the bite wound in her shoulder. Maybe she was weak from blood loss… She tried to move her head around to see the wound properly, but she couldn’t see it very clearly. She could smell blood.

Her brain was encased in fog. It was very difficult to think coherently. What did she know about wounds? Anything? She couldn’t lick it because she couldn’t move her neck around that far. She needed to keep it clean… It was a good thing that she’d been laying on her other side so that there was no sand in the wound. Maybe… If she could get up, she could drag herself to the water. It would be cold, but the salt might help flush the wound.

She moved again, trying to get three of her legs underneath her. She kept her right front leg as still as possible. Still, the pain made her grit her teeth and scream. She was not used to battle wounds. She had little to no pain tolerance for such things. Somehow, she managed to get her paws underneath her and lift herself up. She fell immediately and screamed when the her shoulder was jostled, but forced herself to get back up.

It was slow going. The fight had taken place near the tree line and she had many feet to travel to get to the water. Every slow step was agony. Her shoulder throbbed with every beat of her heart and she could feel warmth in the wound. It had reopened and was bleeding again. She felt woozy but made herself continue. She didn’t want it to get infected. After what felt like an eternity, she dropped heavily into the water, screamed, felt the salt water wash over her wound, screamed again at the sting like there were claws dug into her shoulder, and passed out again.

it was curiosity as the land bridge revealed itself to him in the waning of the tide, about the island and about the flora that might be indigenous to it and no where else in the wilds, that initially draws him in. it's the disappearance of the land bridge that compels him to stay. he swims out, enjoying the salt bath but does not attempt the arduous swim back to the main land. he'd have to stay until the land bridge revealed itself to him once more. he'd found a fat rabbit to sate the worst of his hunger and had just begun to turn his attention to the flora once more when a scream of pain cuts through the sea brine, cooler in the night than it was during the day. the gulls have gone silent for the night, roosting, and at first he convinces himself it came from the mainland. sound travels, after all.

until he hears it again. and then a third time. search for unique and useful flora abandoned he pinpoints the sound to the beach and at first, does not see the heap of she-wolf where she's collapsed upon the sand. she and the sand are the same color but her smell, punctuated by blood as it was despite being mixed with the scent of the sea tells him that she's there; and as brisbane draws nearer a mass he might've otherwise disregarded as flotsam a distinctly canine form takes shape.

shit. he draws. the tide has not yet reached it's highest peak yet and, for the moment, her head, facing in towards the island, is safe. a glimpse heavenward tells him it wouldn't be long before she was at real risk of drowning. he can't assess the damage out here, with the waves constantly lapping over her and her wounds. the salt water worked as a powerful — if not painful — cleanser but the point was he needed to move her.

not knowing the extent of her injuries or if grabbing her by the scruff and dragging her further up the beach would make them worse he hesitates visibly. first thing was first though, he had to try to get her conscious to get her out of the foaming tide as he rules out physically dragging her as a last resort. hey, he says after he nudges her face with his muzzle, realizing how close he was to her teeth and feeling the muscles of his shoulders pull taunt as he expects retaliation if he can manage to coax her awake. you need to get up, else you'll drown in the high tide.

Feel free to PP Brisbane dragging her up the beach! Or whatever you wanna do. Leave her to drown if you want, lmao!

’Hey… hey, hey…’ The word echoed around in her ears as she tried to figure out what was going on. ’… need to get up… up, up… drown… drown, drown… high tide…’ 

She opened her eyes, groaning, and saw a dark shape looming above her face. She was so weak she could not even gasp in fear. Her eyes drooped as soon as she opened them. This wasn’t just from the wound(s). Only the gods knew how long it had been since she’d had anything to eat or drink. She tried to make some kind of noise but all that came out was an incoherent croak. She tried again. “Can’t…” She had expended all possible energy just to get over to the water. She was essentially dead weight at this point, barely able to lift her head, even. She let it (her head) fall back down to the sand with a thump. She was so tired, she didn’t care if she drowned. At least then she’d be out of pain and able to sleep forever…

brisbane's nudges appear to be enough to coax her back to consciousness — she manages to open her eyes for a second or two before they droop and let out a groan. brisbane thinks the croaking noise she makes is an attempt to communicate with him, this assumption solidified when she says simply, exhaustedly 'can't'. he frowns, drawing back some to study the positions of her limbs again and try to note if any of them hang out at an unnatural angle. moving her himself was last resort but it was either move her or let her to the tide's mercy — or lack thereof. ok, he says as he circles her once, relieved that none of her limbs appear to be in a position that appears they've been broken. ok. i'm gonna move you. alright? he doesn't expect a reply ...but he doesn't feel right not giving her the warning.

his intention stated he completes his circle so that he faces her, grasps her scruff betwixt his teeth — not hard enough to hurt her, but he had to have a hard enough grip that he could complete his task — and pulls her along up the beach, letting go of her with a heavy pant, she was more or less like hauling dead weight, when he is sure they are far enough away from the greedy rise of the tide. i didn't hurt you too bad, did i? though, he wasn't sure why he was worried. it didn't look like she was in much of a state to notice; even if he did, she had more pressing wounds that he would need to address.

She was too far gone to even hear anything that the male was saying now. The next thing she knew, she was picked up by the scruff of her neck, too weak and out of it to understand what was even going on, let alone fight back. She’d already forgotten the other male’s presence. Pain tore through her shoulder as he dragged her up the beach, but she was too exhausted to scream. Her body shut down from the pain and the starvation and she blacked out for a minute or two, long enough for the dark male to do his job. 

When she awoke, again, she was staring up at his face. ’I didn't hurt you too bad, did I?’

She blinked slowly, uncomprehending. She was so hungry that she was nauseous. “Food,” she croaked at him, her parched throat barely allowing even that word to escape. Stomach acid roiled uncomfortably within her. She felt like her stomach was eating itself. She tried to focus her eyes on the male, hoping to see some recognition in his gaze to show her that he had understood what she was asking for, but her vision swam. She closed her eyes against the double-vision and passed out again.

there was a feeling that resounds within brisbane as the woman croaks food at him, that this night was going to be a long one. her wounds needed tended to, but she requests food and for a moment the blackshark is torn but ultimately decides that there'd be no use tending to her if she died from starvation on him. alright, he decides. i'll be back with some food. he doesn't bother to tell her to stay there: she wasn't going anywhere and he suspects, as he glimpses at her again, that she's passed out on him again.

luck was on his side. he'd tracked a nest of rabbits and despite the chase that the bigger of the adults led him on, brisbane eventually managed to snag his prey. grasped betwixt his jaws the plump rabbit swings lifelessly as brisbane makes his way back to where he's left the woman. he drops it by her muzzle and gives her a soft nudge to rouse her awake once more. i brought food. it wasn't much but ...for now, it would have to do. her wounds still needed tended to.

Mature Content Warning

This thread has been marked as mature. By reading and/or participating in this thread, you acknowledge that you are of age or have permission from your parents to do so.

The participants have indicated the following reason(s) for this warning: Descriptions of eating a rabbit and strong language.

She didn’t dream while she was passed out for the few minutes that he was gone. When he returned and dropped the rabbit near her head, she took a breath in her blacked-out sleep and smelled blood. Immediately, her pale golden eyes shot open, her nose twitching furiously at the scent of rabbit. Food. She moved herself just enough to position her head over the rabbit and then tore into it as if she were angry at it. She didn’t just eat the rabbit. She destroyed it. She eviscerated it. By the time she was done, she had swallowed all but the largest bones, fur and all. There was naught but some blood and bones on the ground near her face, which was now red with viscera.

The small meal, meager as it was, gave her enough strength to focus her mind a bit better. Her eyes snapped up towards the male who was her savior. So different in every way from the ghost who had nearly destroyed her. He had succeeded in destroying her shoulder, tearing through a muscle or a tendon that would never heal properly. She would limp for life, but she would live. And if she ever saw that son of a bitch again, she would fucking kill him. There was an intensity in her gaze as she kept her eyes on the dark male before her. “Thank you,” she said, though the words did not match her expression.

She forced herself to calm down, to not relive the adrenaline of the fight. She needed to stay calm and focus on healing. “I… My shoulder is wrecked. I may have other wounds I don’t know about.” It hurt to admit to this stranger that she was injured, but it’s not as though he didn’t already know that, and he’d taken the time to hunt for her (and drag her from the water’s grasping fingers, though she did not remember that part). “Do you… know anything about wounds?” It was a long shot that the first friendly face she might meet was a healer, but she had to ask. If he’d stuck around long enough to feed her, maybe he could help with her shoulder.

it doesn't take long to coax her back to consciousness, if anything, this time around it proved much easier than the last and whatever energy she'd been storing up appeared to have been ignited as she smells the fresh kill. he takes a few steps back to give her privacy as she eats ...though eat is putting it mildly. she devours the rabbit as if she is famine reincarnated. when she is done, brisbane notes as he spares what is left of the rabbit, there are only big bones leaving nothing to the scavengers. brisbane's attention returns to her as she thanks him. you're lucky i found you when i did, wounds aside she'd faced a real threat of being the sea's latest victim. the sea's rarely kind. it was a bizarre way of saying 'you're welcome' but it's what the blackshark means, in so many words.

the conversation shifts then to the next priority: her wounds. clinically, he moves closer so he can inspect the damage as she speaks of it. her shoulder, primarily. she calls it 'wrecked' and he has to agree with it. it looks pretty fucked up and a lot of out of his depth. though the specialities of botanist and healer often overlap the more involved things are better left to a healer; but they're stranded on this isle until the sand bar returns with the recession of the tide and not only that, he wouldn't even know where to begin to look for a healer.

for better or worse, he's all she has. i'm a botanist, he explains. a healer might be able to do a little more when it comes to extensive injuries, such as her shoulder. but i can still heal. he assures her. i could give you something for the pain and i can make a salve to keep infection at bay and keep it clean, though salt water's a great disinfectant. he turns a thoughtful eye, of twin fiery suns to study her to see if he could determine any other injuries. try to feel past your shoulder. does anything else hurt?

Since the fight thread’s not over, I’m just gonna say she can’t feel any other wounds and if she is wounded more later, I’ll attribute it to shock or something. If that’s cool?

She barked out a bitter laugh when the male said that the sea is rarely kind. “The sea swallowed me whole and then spat me out on this fucking island,” she snapped. “No doubt it will attempt to kill me again. Probably soon.” 

The sandy girl watched him as he moved closer to her, trying to shift a bit so he could see her shoulder better. Part of the problem, though, was that it was nighttime. He would have no daylight to aid him. “I lay where I did when you found me because I thought the salt would help with the wound. I wasn’t thinking clearly, so drowning in the tide never crossed my mind.” If she’d been thinking clearly earlier, she muttered internally, she wouldn’t even be having this problem. Why the fuck had she decided to yell at that ghost in the first place? Maybe he was crazy, but if she hadn’t instigated the fight, she might not be injured at all right now.

“Something for the pain would be great,” she admitted, gritting her teeth as her shoulder twinged again. The pain radiated outward from the wound with each heartbeat, but the little bit of strength from the rabbit at least helped her to ignore it a bit. She still needed water, though, and seawater was not an option. 

’Try to feel past your shoulder. Does anything else hurt?’

She closed her eyes and focused on different body parts, trying to tell if there were any other serious wounds on her. “I… I can’t feel anything. Just a general… soreness. But that might just be from getting knocked around by a storm in the water.” A storm that had taken everything from her. Even her name.

sounds good!

the laugh that tears itself from the woman is devoid of any mirth, tinged as it was with unapologetic bitterness, her words giving her merit for that feeling. brisbane is quiet, contemplative. yet, you survived, brisbane feels obligated to point out to her. the sea is known to be unpredictable but it is possible to navigate it. spoken from the experience of having grown up by the sea. learning the phases of the moon, the tides and how to get one's self out of a rip current is all basic information pups of the bay have drilled into them as soon as they are old enough to understand and retain it.

aye, but it's a painful way, he comments absently, but nevertheless was impressed that it was her first instinct. it wasn't a wrong instinct. with no other option it was better than letting it alone to potentially fester with bacteria. infection would cause a pain worse than the sting of the salt water which numbed after time. i actually saw some yarrow a way's in a bit nearby a fresh water stream, he gestures towards the island's heart, pleased that he'd been there early enough to have the time to inspect it's native flora. that'll help with pain and further keep infection from setting it. and, well, if she was that hungry she might also be suffering from dehydration as well. the stream sounded like a good place to set up camp ...if she could make it that far.

d'ya think you have enough energy to walk? he could bring the yarrow to her, sure, but the water? there wasn't any way to effectively bring that to her. it's not too far and you can lean on me if you need to. brisbane might exist in the grey area of morality but he was a blackshark and taleigha didn't raise him to be a boar.

Strand nodded absently at the male’s words, only half paying attention as the pain settled in her shoulder again. The rabbit had only given her so much energy and now she could feel herself sinking back down into oblivion again. She heard and repeated the word “yarrow” and was about to pass out again when she heard him ask a question. Did she have enough energy to walk? She could lean on him if she needed to.

“I…” she began, fighting to keep her eyes open. “I don’t know.” But even as she said it, she could feel herself getting her paws underneath her. “I’m afraid the wound will open more if I move,” she said, her voice stronger as she woke up a bit more. Slowly, shakily, she stood up on three legs. She collapsed immediately, but forced herself to stand again and leaned into the male at once to keep herself upright. “Let’s go,” she said, her voice shaking from the effort of standing. “Before I pass out again.”

she repeats the word 'yarrow' back at him, yeah, that's right. yarrow. he murmurs with a nod, watching with concern now as she teeters on the edge of passing out again. her own concern was valid: he couldn't guarantee that it wouldn't open worse if she moved but he also knows that she couldn't stay here. she'd die of dehydration. its a risk, he doesn't lie to her. brisbane's a lot of things but never a liar. but it's either take the risk and live or die of dehydration. maybe he could learn to be a bit more sensitive but he doesn't see the point in candy coating dire situations either. she deserved to know the stakes she was gambling with, if she didn't already.

but she's already pushing herself to her paws only to collapse. c'mon, you can do it. he encourages her. he's been there before. true, his wounds hadn't been on his shoulder and hadn't affected his ability to walk but they'd affected his ability to eat and drink. he remembered the blinding pain he'd felt every time he tried to chew or open his muzzle to weakly lap half-heartedly at the water; but he'd pushed through because he had a pack to lead, he had siblings and a mother to care for, because the pain was preferable to wasting away and dying.

brisbane watches as she struggles to her paws once more, and offers himself as support as she leans against him. we'll take it slow. let me know if you need to stop or anything. 'it wasn't far' probably felt a lot like a thousand miles away to her at the moment and brisbane didn't want to push her too much.

She could barely hear any of the words that the male spoke to her as they began their walk up the beach away from the water. She wasn’t sure where exactly they were going and the walk felt like it was taking a hundred years. Each step took so much out of her that she thought she would collapse at any time. She leaned heavily on him, too tired and out of it to care if she was heavy or not. Probably she wasn’t too heavy, starving as she was. Her ribs stuck out from her body even through the fur. She looked like she was a walking cadaver for all the meat on her bones. Her eyes were sunken and had lost their light. Her breathing was ragged. Fighting immediately after awakening on the island had been a terrible idea. Whatever strength she’d had when she’d woken up had been sapped by her scuffle with the ghost and now she was paying the price for it. If the dark male currently pressing against her side had not shown up, she surely would have died. She let her mind go blank and let him lead her where he would.

Eventually they made it to wherever he was taking her, and she passed out as he began to tend her wounds. When she awoke some time later, he was gone.